A prime minister enjoying a near-two-thirds majority in parliament dissolves the house, citing his constitutional prerogative. Most of his own party legislators join the opposition in denouncing the move as a ‘coup’ and petitioning the Supreme Court to reinstate the legislature.
Parties that turned Nepal into a federal democratic republic are now on the streets scrambling for space already occupied by groups demanding a return of the monarchy and more extreme republicans, secularists and federalists. What just happened?
You have to go back a decade and a half. In 2005, India facilitates a deal between seven mainstream Nepalese opposition parties agitating against the monarchy and Maoist rebels waging a bloody decade-long insurgency against parliament and the palace. Behind the democracy banner, India’s unspoken objective is to pull Nepal away from the tilt it sees the palace take towards China. Despite having armed the monarchy fight the Maoists, China becomes the ultimate beneficiary in Nepal.
Nepal-India relations – touted as unparalleled in the world for the depth and diversity – hit their nadir, as the communist government in Kathmandu prepares a new political map of the country incorporating territory Nepal accuses India of illegally occupying for decades. Before India can react, the government amends the Constitution to include the new map with overwhelming cross-party support.
Oli’s pronouncements turn eerily wild. In parliament, he asserts that the coronavirus strain entering Nepal from India is more virulent than that from China. Then, he publicly accuses New Delhi of instigating rivals to oust him from power. Before long, Oli maintains that Lord Ram was born in Nepal, not Ayodhya, accusing India of cultural encroachment.
The Nepal Communist Party, despite its near-two-thirds majority in parliament, is deeply divided. The Chinese ambassador is actively involved in preventing a party split. India is left agog at Oli’s audacity, but more so at China’s inroads. The stakes rise as New Delhi and Beijing are locked in their worst border clashes since the 1962 war.
And the monarch deposed ostensibly for his pro-Chinese tilt? Citizen Gyanendra Shah remains the de facto head of state, issuing messages on national occasions and exhorting his successors not to upset the precarious balance his ancestors struck between the Asian giants to maintain Nepal’s independence. Quietly, India and China continue engaging with him. What happened?
In retrospect, Beijing’s intentions were visible early on. Having supported the Royal Nepal Army’s operations against the Maoist rebels towards the very end, Beijing conveniently replaced its ambassador. The new Chinese envoy became the first foreign representative to present credentials to the prime minister concurrently acting as head of state. The substance of the move would outweigh its symbolism.
There were two fatal flaws in India’s approach: facilitating the abolition of the monarchy and empowering the Maoists. First, the world’s only Hindu monarch and kingdom were bound to India in a special relationship that neither country needed to define or assert. The Nepalese king’s patronage of India’s vast Hindu population also was a guarantee that the palace would not stray too far from the civilisational relationship. True, Indians had seen successive Nepalese monarchs playing New Delhi off against Beijing. A little more compassion for Nepal’s compulsions might have put things into sharper relief.
Second, Nepalese communists closely resembled their Indian cousins. But as communists first, they were trained to denounce Indian ‘expansionism’ before American ‘imperialism’. Experience might have impelled the senior leadership to make practical compromises. It was a leap of faith for New Delhi to trust the leadership to rein in their cadres’ radicalism.
Since India had rallied the Western democracies in 2005, it needed to address their concerns as well throughout the twists and turns of Nepal’s transition. The Chinese could act purely on their national interests. More broadly, India monumentally misread China and Chinese perceptions of Nepal. A policy based on the amity that opened up the Nathu-la Pass to Sino-Indian trade could not work in the era of Doklam and Galwan.
Given their great power aspirations, China and India are likely to intensify their rivalry over Nepal. The three countries urgently need to stabilise the triangle. India needs to cease seeing Nepal as a Chinese client and recognise the pressures it bears from Beijing. Understanding that China, too, sees Nepal – the last tributary state to the Qing dynasty – as part of its sphere of influence would help India reach more rational choices. As they continue to experience the asphyxiating presence of the Chinese, Nepalese, too, would be impelled to find a geostrategic equilibrium between the two giant neighbours. With their fundamental interests addressed, the Chinese might resist overplaying their hand in Nepal.
Based on the author’s upcoming book Backfire in Nepal: How India Lost the Plot to China.
